Of daffs, a missing penis, melting-down, Byron rescued, a smashing time at the airport, cats vs octopus and the hit-maker

Do you have a "Sussex Beacon" in your garden? The RHS needs help to map the UK’s daffodils as part of its new ‘Daffodil Diaries’ project, and to find varieties that are thought to be lost.

It's another snippets post, dear reader:

• "Penisgate" news: Italy’s state broadcaster RAI has been accused of censorship after using an image of Leonardo da Vinci’s Vitruvian Man with the genitals missing in the opening credits for its Winter Olympics coverage. It's not the first penis-related controversy to hit the Winter games, either!
• Festival melted-down? news: The eclectic and unpredictable annual Meltdown music festival - previously overseen by cultural giants such as (among others) David Bowie, Grace Jones, David Byrne, Patti Smith, Scott Walker, Jarvis Cocker and Nick Cave - is a highlight of the Southbank Centre's summer schedule, and the 2026 event is to be curated this year [to mark the Centre's 75th anniversary] by... former boyband member and modern "style icon" Harry Styles. Ho hum. We shall see what he comes up with that might tempt us (for the first time in years) to even want to bother buying a ticket...

• Byron's moving news: A memorial statue of the 19th Century poet Lord Byron marooned on an inaccessible traffic island on Park Lane for decades and left to deteriorate is to be restored and moved to a new home in Hyde Park. “Then stirs the feeling infinite, so felt / In solitude, where we are least alone.” Indeed.
• First road rage, then air rage, now "boarding pass rage"? news: Check-in at the airport can be frustrating, but... this man took it to a new level in Hong Kong International airport! I think I'd just sit in the Wetherspoons and wait, tbh.
• Favourite headline of the year so far: Cats to Blame for Octopus Deity Enshrinement Delay. Love it.
• And finally: RIP Billy Steinberg, the most famous and prolific songwriter you never heard of. A list of just some of the songs he wrote reads like a "Best of" album of the last few decades:
  • Madonna - Like A Virgin
  • Cyndi Lauper - True Colors
  • Bangles - Eternal Flame
  • Roy Orbison/Cyndi Lauper - I Drove All Night
  • Heart - Alone
  • Whitney Houston - So Emotional
  • Divinyls - I Touch Myself
  • Pretenders - I'll Stand By You
  • Tina Turner - Look Me In The Heart
  • Melanie C - I Turn To You

  ...and this one, a fave of mine:

Robert Miles feat. Maria Nayler - One & One

And the weather? Not bad. [Today was a lovely, occasionally sunny, dry day - but bloody cold!}